GARANTIQA GETS STRONGER ON A DECREASING LOAN MARKET

2009/05/27
Press release

The general assembly of Garantiqa has modified the company's business plan for this year. "During the first quarter, the company's guarantee amount has grown, an ever bigger amount of loan cases with guarantee requests is directed to us, but even this development could not compensate the decrease in SME loans" - stated György Radnai, CEO of the company.

SME loans have experienced a significant decrease during the first four months of this year, and even though the banks make Garantiqa give a guarantee to an ever bigger part of the loans, the growth of the guarantee portfolio has not reached the pace which the company forecasted last December. "Our plan to guarantee a total amount of 700 billion HUF has been decreased to 400 billion, which is realistic, and still 10% higher compared to last year" - said György Radnai, adding that considering the developments of the last few days, the risk of the plan is much more towards the positive side.

The CEO added that the announced changes during the last few weeks, the considerable value limit increase of the guarantee given to one company, the raise of the guarantee rate from 80% to 90%, and the effects of the bigger risk taking cannot be measured as of yet. Apart from this, Garantiqa wishes to participate in every such governmental crisis management initiative, in which the emphasis is put on providing loans for enterprises. The 1800 billion HUF program, financed through EU funds, which is meant to speed up the building industry is a typical example, which in itself can raise the company's guarantee portfolio towards the earlier goal. Furthermore, Garantiqa is open for participation in a program initiated to aid foreign currency loan takers, since the 900 billion HUF guarantee frame, secured by the state budget, still leaves enough space for the company to be a partner in every activity that requires a guarantee.

Until the end of April, the company has undertaken new guarantees in an amount of 113 billion HUF for 9595 applications, this way the total guarantee portfolio has grown by 23 billion HUF to 433 billion.